1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus, an information processing method, and a program that use a print job including setting information and printing data and generate drawing data.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is what is called production printing for printing and binding a huge amount of commercial documents (see Patent Document 1, for example). Patent Document 1 discloses a printing system capable of notifying a user of whether a post process is available in consideration of an entire portion of the printing system.
In the production printing, a printing process is often handled as a workflow. There is a trend of opening printing workflows. Through opening, it is possible for software (a workflow application described below) and printing devices of various companies to describe setting of print jobs in a main process of printing in a common description method. A standard format called Job Definition Format (JDF) is known as a format for describing an entire portion of the printing workflow.
The printing workflow has various types of processes such as creation of a document or contents, specification of a printing method, printing, and post processing. Although each process is performed by various workflow applications and printing devices, the JDF enables cooperation between the printing devices, printing process management, and the like irrespective of difference of the workflow applications and difference of manufacturers of the printing devices.
However, each workflow application or printing device may extend the JDF and the JDF created by the workflow application of a company may include a description specific to the workflow application. In this case, it is known that there may be a situation where a workflow application or a printing device positioned downstream cannot analyze or process the JDF.
In order to solve such a problem, the workflow application or the printing device positioned downstream may convert a JDF created by the workflow application positioned upstream into a format that can be handled by the workflow application or the printing device positioned downstream.
FIG. 1-(a) is an example of a diagram schematically illustrating conversion of a JDF. A workflow application of company A (hereafter simply referred to as “application 12”) creates a print job 1001 including a JDF 81a in a company A form and Page Description Language (PDL) 82. While the PDL is a language for specifying drawing contents of a page image (rasterized image), the PDL here means printing data described in the PDL. Examples of the PDL include Portable Document Format (PDF), PostScript, PCL, RPDL, and the like.
A user of a Digital Front End (DFE) 32 of company C converts the JDF 81a in the company A form into a JDF 81c in a company C form by conversion software 70. In accordance with this, a print job 1002 having the JDF 81c in the company C form and the PDL 82 is obtained. The conversion software 70 is created by company C or created for company C. Accordingly, the DFE 32 of company C can analyze the JDF 81c in the company C form and perform a downstream process (such as rendering). The DFE 32 is a printing device positioned downstream relative to the application 12.
However, since it is necessary for the user of the DFE 32 of company C to convert the JDF using the conversion software 70, a conversion function may be incorporated into the DFE 32.
FIG. 1-(b) is an example of a diagram showing the DFE 32 of company C having a function 71 of converting a JDF. The DFE 32 of company C has this conversion function 71 that is the same as the conversion software 70 and converts the JDF 81a in the company A form into job attributes 1005 within DFE (the numerals 1005 are omitted hereafter). The “job attributes within DFE” are obtained by converting the JDF 81a in the company A form into setting information about printing supported by an RIP engine of company C. An RIP engine 59 of company C is a rendering engine that generates raster data. The RIP engine 59 of company C uses the “job attributes within DFE” and a “PDL” to perform rendering.
However, since users have used the JDF 81c in the company C form converted by the conversion software 70 upon rendering in the past, the users may wish to confirm whether the conversion function 71 of the DFE 32 is the same as the conversion software 70. Further, if the users start printing on a sheet without confirming whether a print result 1003 via the conversion software 70 is the same as a print result 1004 via the conversion function 71 of the DFE 32 of company C, this may result in unnecessary print costs.
[Patent Document 1] Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2012-238188